AMERICAN INSTITUTE. 219 



the rate of from twenty tons to thirty tons on an acre. Spfengel (a cele- 

 brated agricultural chemist,) says, that to a German acre, (about two- 

 thirds of the English acre,) there should be applied from 20,000 to 30,000 

 pounds weight of the urine, &c. The effect lasts but one year. The 

 Flemish farmers use 2,840 gallons on an English acre, for flax. They do 

 it clumsily. The English do it much as we sprinkle streets with water, 

 from suitable carts. It is always more efficient on light sandy than on 

 heavy clay soils and loams. Swiss ftvrmers, after every mowing of their 

 grass, sprinkle with their mist-wasser, liquid manure, for a new growth of 

 grass. Some grass fields manured in this way by Harley, the proprietor 

 of the celebrated Willowbank dairy, at Glasgow, cut grass on some of his 

 fields six times in one season, and at each cutting the grass was about 

 fifteen inches long. Singular, but it does more harm than good to barley. 

 It makes potatoes large, but sometimes watery. Not so good for turnips 

 as barn-yard manure. 



Liquid manure, such as night soil and water, was practiced by the 

 Chinese from the earliest period. Cato says the Romans mixed grape 

 stones with water to fertilize their olive trees. Columella says, (1800 

 years ago,) that putrid stale urine and lees of oil are good for grape vines 

 and apple trees, 



Evelyn, of modern times, proposed artificial mixtures, dung, urine, salt, 

 lime, nitre, in the following proportions : Salt, one part, lime, two parts, 

 mixed in a heap, to lay so two or three months, turned over sometimes. 

 "When used, add twenty to thirty bushels of it to ten or fifteen tons of 

 water, and apply to one acre. All manures, organic or inorganic, should 

 be dissolved for the use of plants. Artificial liquid manures is largely used 

 on the continent of Europe, and was so before the Englisn farmers used 

 it. Swiss farmers call it guile, the French call it lizier, and the Germans 

 call it mist-wasser. In the German states and in the Netherlands, they 

 sweep the dung of their stall fed cattle into reservoirs underground, mixing 

 it with four or five times its bulk of water, according to the richness of the 

 manure. Five reservoirs are provided, large enough each to receive the 

 manure made in one week, so that each may have four weeks to foment ; 

 then it is pumped into water carts or large open vessels. Same practice 

 in northern Italy. It should be spread very even on the land. The pota- 

 toe thrives remarkably with five or six bushels of salt an acre. The liquid 

 manure is injured by clear sunshine, and we should always, if we can, 

 apply it in cloudy weather. Human urine, says Berzelius, contains almost 

 everything a vegetable requires, viz.: 



Water, 93.300 



Urea, 3.010 



Henry Steele, of Jersey city, exhibited his patent Bee-hive Moth Pre- 

 venter. Small metallic doors over the entrances are readily managed by 

 the bees, but no moth understands it, and can't get in. 



Mr. Pell. — Will not these doors brush off the wax material ? 

 Steele. — Not at all. Bees know how to enter without any damage. 



